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Harrington Fails to Add Much to Irish Celebration

STRAFFAN, Ireland -- It should have been Padraig Harrington's day at the Ryder Cup. Golf's most famous team competition made its debut on Irish soil and Europe seemed pleased with its 5-3 lead over the Americans.

Most of the 45,000 spectators who flocked to the K Club just outside Dublin were there to cheer on their local star, and he beamed with joy at the reception when he walked onto the first tee.

Padraig Harrington was only able to produce a half point in front of the home country fans.

When Harrington came off the 18th green, however, the celebrations were muted. The contribution by the pride of Ireland to Europe's first day lead on Friday was a meager one-half point.

After Harrington and Colin Montgomerie were beaten 1-up by Tiger Woods and Jim Furyk in their morning better-ball match, the Irishman teamed up with countryman Paul McGinley in the afternoon alternate-shot session. Up two holes with three to play, it seemed as if Harrington had rewarded the fans who had waited so long to see him play in the Ryder Cup in his hometown.

But that lead collapsed and the Irish pair wound up with a tie, worth half a point, as Chad Campbell and Zach Johnson birdied the last three holes.

Harrington's wayward play was largely to blame for losing the lead. His tee shot at the 18th, with the Irish pair still 1-up, put McGinley in trouble in the rough alongside a fairway bunker. After McGinley had partially rescued the situation, Harrington launched their third shot so far over the green it almost landed in the water. Although McGinley saved par, the Americans made birdie and squared the match.

Harrington, who had won seven of 12 Ryder Cup matches before Friday, gave credit to the Americans rather than cursing his own play.

'It's disappointing that we didn't win, but I think that Chad and Zach deserved the half,' he said. 'They finished birdie-birdie-birdie, which is what was asked.

'They certainly played good enough golf to get the half. They didn't make any mistakes in the last three holes, and even all the way through the round they played well. I don't begrudge them a half, but I'm a little bit disappointed that we didn't win the match.'

It was all so different two years ago.

Playing with Montgomerie, Harrington won the opening match of Europe's lopsided 18 1/2-9 1/2 victory at Oakland Hills when they beat the top American duo of Woods and Phil Mickelson. He also sank a 30-foot putt to beat Jay Haas in his singles match and finished with four points for the week.

Arriving at the K Club just a few miles from his home, he was expected to be lifted by the hometown support, especially with Woods again in the rival pairing.

Spraying shots into the rough and the water, however, Harrington seemed like a stranger to his local club, and his Irish fans had few chances to cheer their local star. They saw Furyk give the Americans the lead at the first hole with a five-foot birdie putt after Woods had snap-hooked his own tee shot into the lake.

Although Harrington and Montgomerie turned the match their way by going ahead at the seventh, the Americans hit back to move 3-up after a streak of birdies from the eighth.

'Eight to 12 really killed us,' Harrington said. 'We had a lot of chances and (the Americans) happened to hole a lot during those holes. We came out of them 3-down and should have come out 1 or 2-up.'

Montgomerie's birdie 2 at 13 cut the lead to two. But, with holes running out, Harrington pulled his second shot at 15 into the crowd and left the Scot to make sure the Americans didn't go further ahead.

Harrington birdied the par 5, 555-yard 16th to cut the lead to one, but both Europeans missed birdie putts from about 20 feet at 17 and Furyk captured the first point of this Ryder Cup by leaving his first putt to tap-in range.

Because his opening match lasted almost five hours, Harrington only had a few minutes to recover for the afternoon session alongside McGinley and missed a five-foot putt at the first to hand the early lead to Campbell and Johnson.

Harrington rolled in a 20-foot birdie putt at the third to even the match, and the Irish pair then capitalized on some erratic putting by Johnson and Campbell to take a two-hole lead with three to play. But it all went wrong in the closing holes.

McGinley, who holed the winning putt at the 2002 Ryder Cup at the Belfry and also played on the victorious European team at Oakland Hills two years ago, knows how much it meant to the Irish fans to see the event at the K Club.

'I think we're very lucky to be playing a Ryder Cup in Ireland,' he said. 'We had wonderful support from the Irish people. It was just fantastic. What a great thrill to play before your home crowd to have them that passionate as they were today.'

Tiger's checklist: How he can contend at Augusta

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. – Augusta is already on the minds of most players here at the Honda Classic, and that includes the only one in the field with four green jackets.

Yes, Tiger Woods has been talking about the Masters ever since he started this latest comeback at Torrey Pines. These three months are all about trying to build momentum for the year’s first major.

Woods hasn’t revealed his schedule past this week, but his options are limited. He’s a good bet to play at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, where he has won eight times, but adding another start would be a departure from the norm. He’s not eligible for the two World Golf Championship events, in Mexico and Austin, and he has never played the Valspar Championship or the Houston Open.

So there’s a greater sense of urgency this week at PGA National, which is realistically one of his final tune-ups.

How will Woods know if he’s ready to contend at Augusta? Here’s his pre-Masters checklist:

1. Stay healthy

So far, so good, as Woods tries to resume a normal playing schedule following four back surgeries since 2014. Though he vowed to learn from his past mistakes and not push himself, it was a promising sign that Woods felt strong enough to sign up for the Honda, the second of back-to-back starts on separate coasts.

Another reason for optimism on the health front: The soreness that Woods felt after his season opener at Torrey Pines wasn’t related to his surgically repaired back. No, what ached most were his feet – he wasn’t used to walking 72 holes on hilly terrain.

Woods is stiffer than normal, but that’s to be expected. His back is fused.

2. Figure out his driver

Augusta National is more forgiving off the tee than most major courses, putting more of a premium on approach shots and recoveries.

That’s good news for Woods, who has yet to find a reliable tee shot. Clearly, he is most comfortable playing a fade and wants to take the left side of the course out of play, but in competition he’s been plagued by a two-way miss.

In two starts this year, Woods has hit only 36 percent of the fairways, no matter if he was using driver, fairway wood or long iron.

Unfortunately, Woods is unlikely to gain any significant insight into his driver play this week. PGA National’s Champion Course isn’t overly long, but there is water on 15 of the 18 holes. As a result, he said he likely will hit driver only four times a round, maybe five, and otherwise rely on his 3-wood and 2-iron.

Said Rory McIlroy: “Being conservative off the tee is something that you have to do here to play well.”

That won’t be the case at Augusta.

3. Clean up his iron play

As wayward as Woods has been off the tee, his iron play hasn’t impressed, either.

At Riviera, he hit only 16 greens in regulation – his fewest in a Tour event as a professional. Of course, Woods’ chances of hitting the green are reduced when he’s playing from the thick rough, sand and trees, but he also misfired on six of the eight par 3s.

Even when Woods does find the green, he’s not close enough to the hole. Had he played enough rounds to qualify, his proximity to the hole (39 feet, 7 inches) would rank 161st on Tour.

That won’t be good enough at Augusta, where distance control and precision are paramount.

Perhaps that’s why Justin Thomas said last week what many of us were thinking: “I would say he’s a pretty good ways away.”

4. Get into contention somewhere

As much as he would have liked to pick off a win on the West Coast, Woods said that it’s not a prerequisite to have a chance at the Masters. He cited 2010, when he tied for fourth despite taking four months off after the fallout from his scandal.

In reality, though, there hasn’t been an out-of-nowhere Masters champion since Charl Schwartzel in 2011. Since then, every player who eventually donned the green jacket either already had a win that year or at least a top-3 finish worldwide.

“I would like to play well,” Woods said. “I would like to win golf tournaments leading into it. The years I’ve won there, I’ve played really well early.”

Indeed, he had at least one win in all of the years he went on to win the Masters (1997, 2000, ’01, ’05). Throw in the fact that Woods is nearly five years removed from his last Tour title, and it’s reasonable to believe that he at least needs to get himself into contention before he can seriously entertain winning another major.

And so that’s why he’s here at the Honda, trying to find his game with seven weeks to go.

Players winner to get 3-year exemption into PGA

Although The Players isn’t golf’s fifth major, it received a boost in that direction this week.

The PGA of America has adjusted its criteria for eligibility into the PGA Championship, extending an exemption for the winner of The Players to three years.

According to an official with the PGA of America, the association felt the winner of The Players deserved more than a single-year exemption, which had been the case, and the move is consistent with how the PGA Tour’s annual flagship event is treated by the other majors.

Winners of The Players were already exempt for three years into the Masters, U.S. Open and The Open Championship.

Thomas: Playing in front of Tiger even more chaotic

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. – Justin Thomas may be going from the frying pan to the fire of Tiger Woods’ pairings.

Translation: He’s going from being grouped with Woods last week in the first two rounds at the Genesis Open to being grouped directly in front of Woods this week at the Honda Classic.

“Which might be even worse than playing with him,” Thomas said Wednesday.

Typically, the pairing in front of Woods deals with a lot of gallery movement, with fans racing ahead to get in position to see Woods’ next shot.

Thomas was quoted after two rounds with Tiger at Riviera saying fans “got a little out of hand,” and saying it’s disappointing some golf fans today think it’s “so amusing to yell and all that stuff while we’re trying to hit shots.”

With 200,000 fans expected this week at the Honda Classic, and with the Goslings Bear Trap pavilion setting a party mood at the 16th green and 17th tee, that portion of the course figures to be quite lively at PGA National.

“I touched on this a little bit last week,” Thomas said. “I think it got blown out of proportion, was just taken out of context, and worded differently than how I said it or meant it.

“I love the fans. The fans are what I hope to have a lot of, what all of us hope to have a lot of. We want them cheering us on. But it's those certain fans that are choosing to yell at the wrong times, or just saying stuff that's completely inappropriate.”

Thomas said it’s more than ill-timed shouts. It’s the nature of some things being said.

“It's one thing if it's just you and I talking, but when you're around kids, when you're around women, when you're around families, or just around people in general, some of the stuff they are saying to us is just extremely inappropriate,” he said. “There’s really no place for it anywhere, especially on a golf course.

“I feel like golf is pretty well known as a classy sport, not that other sports aren't, but it has that reputation.”

Thomas said the nature of the 17th hole at PGA National’s Champion Course makes it a more difficult tee shot than the raucous 16th at the Waste Management Phoenix Open. Typically, players like to hear fans get into the action before or after they hit shots. Ill-timed bluster, however, makes a shot like the one at Honda’s 17th even tougher.

“That hole is hard enough,” Thomas said. “I don't need someone yelling in my ear on my backswing that I'm going to hit it in the water, to make it any harder. I hope it gets better, just for the sake of the game. That's not helping anything. That's not helping grow the game.”

Those who follow golf know an ill-timed shout in a player’s backswing is different than anything a fan says at a football, basketball or baseball game. An ill-timed comment in a backswing has a greater effect on the outcome of a competition.

“Just in terms of how much money we're playing for, how many points we're playing for ... this is our jobs out here, and you hate to somehow see something that a fan does, or something that they yell, influence something that affects [a player’s] job,” Thomas said.

Rory: Phil said RC task force just copied Europe

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. – Playing the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am two weeks ago, Rory McIlroy quizzed Phil Mickelson about what the Americans got out of the U.S. Ryder Cup task force’s overhaul.

McIlroy and Mickelson were paired together at Pebble Beach.

“Basically, all they are doing is copying what the Europeans have done,” McIlroy said. “That's what he said.”

The Europeans claimed their sixth of seven Ryder Cups with their victory at Gleneagles in 2014. That brought about a sea change in the way the United States approached the Ryder Cup. Mickelson called out the tactics in Gleneagles of captain Tom Watson, who was outmaneuvered by European captain Paul McGinley.

The Americans defeated Europe at Hazeltine two years ago with that new European model.

“He said the first thing they did in that task force was Phil played a video, a 12-minute video of Paul McGinley to all of them,” McIlroy said. “So, they are copying what we do, and it's working for them. It's more cohesive, and the team and the core of that team are more in control of what they are doing, instead of the PGA of America recruiting and someone telling them what to do.”